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11 ii II 11 Friday, April 14, 1995 .1 .I . Volume 58 Number 71 - s 4 .1 BRIAN NICHOLSONTHE SIGNPOST Read my lips: No new 'tuxes' ASWSU executive vice presidential candidates Scot Wahlquist and Audrey Davidson responded to questions concerning funding of the Crystal Crest awards banquet at an open-floor debate Thursday in Wildcat Theater. Balloting concludes today at 1 p.m. and winners will be announced tonight at the CAB Spring Party at 7 p.m. in the union building ballroom. Gender, age prejudice evident at WSU By Kimberly Carroll Signpost arts editor A new study conducted by two Weber State University psychology professors suggests students are judging the competence of their professors on the basis of gender and age stereotypes. The study, conducted by Julianne Arbuckleand Benne Williams, reveals that on the average young male professors consistently received more positive evaluations while young female professors received more negative comments. Becauseof the finding Arbuckle said she believes "there are no objective evaluations that are going on right now." Williams said he started to wonder if there were biases in teacher evaluations because of some things he had seen previously."I noticed last year when I was department chair. . . that the difference was so great between the negative comment ratio females receiv ed compared to the negative comments the males got that 1 began to get kind of suspicious," Williams said. During this same time period, Arbuckle had been conducting extensive literary research for the psychology of women class at vFYrfJiJ ! ) 1iJfTniriK; r - r i b J 1 1 LJ 1L J WSU and said she had the same suspicions about possible gender biases as Williams. From there, the two decided to see what was really going on at WSU by conducting a study in a classroom setting. Williamsand Arbucklesaid the study was an attempt to discover how males and females comparatively rated their teachers at WSU so that any previous biases students may have would be uncovered."We essentially put together a programmed instruction that involved a standard lecture given to all the students," Williams said. A slide presentation and a prerecorded lecture were given randomly to four different Psychology 101 classes during autumn quarter 1994. In order to control the differentiation factors that sometimes interfere, such as voice patterns, the lecture was prerecorded and great lengths were taken to control the variables, Arbuckle said. Of the four teachers who were selected, two were a male and female under the age of 35, and two were a male and female over 55. "A female voice read both of the lectures for the women and A male voice read both of the lectures for the men, so we control led for voice," Arbuckle said. "In the slide pictures that were taken of the people, the people were placed in exactly the same way, standing the same way and wearing cardigans. The only differences were the gender and the age." Before the lectures began, class members were given an outline of the lecture and informed of the learning objectives. Following the lecture, students were quizzed on the lecture and asked to fill out separate class-andteacher-evaluation forms. Theclassevaluation dealt with the overall content and usefulness of the material, while the teacher evaluation form focused on how individuals perceived the person who was teaching by rating them on terms such as friendliness, nature, honesty, sense of humor, sociability and generosity. These characteristics were selected from a list of general stereotypes, Williams said. "The only difference between all the conditions were the pictures of a young female and an older female, a young male and an older male," he said. Arbuckle said that in terms of teaching abilities, the younger male was pereei ved to be the most credible, while "the older male was perceiv ed as more generous, tolerant and brave." She further added that, in general, the older male was perceived as "a regular boy scout." According to a findings paper the two wrote on the experience, overall scores from the evalua te- Prejudice pae 2 Quick Takes , v.u. J.. , v-sv k: ... V' ... I I A&E Students' future on hold until they learn to hold a fork. See page 5 News Issues Forum gives candidates one more chance to reach voters. See page 2 lOoinion M- Value of Utah's pre-statehood history should not be ignored. See page 4 Sports WSU's Hickman can really throw the stick, man. Sec page 6 Weather Friday Chance of showers 60s30s Weekend a6 Chance of showers 60s30s

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11 ii II 11 Friday, April 14, 1995 .1 .I . Volume 58 Number 71 - s 4 .1 BRIAN NICHOLSONTHE SIGNPOST Read my lips: No new 'tuxes' ASWSU executive vice presidential candidates Scot Wahlquist and Audrey Davidson responded to questions concerning funding of the Crystal Crest awards banquet at an open-floor debate Thursday in Wildcat Theater. Balloting concludes today at 1 p.m. and winners will be announced tonight at the CAB Spring Party at 7 p.m. in the union building ballroom. Gender, age prejudice evident at WSU By Kimberly Carroll Signpost arts editor A new study conducted by two Weber State University psychology professors suggests students are judging the competence of their professors on the basis of gender and age stereotypes. The study, conducted by Julianne Arbuckleand Benne Williams, reveals that on the average young male professors consistently received more positive evaluations while young female professors received more negative comments. Becauseof the finding Arbuckle said she believes "there are no objective evaluations that are going on right now." Williams said he started to wonder if there were biases in teacher evaluations because of some things he had seen previously."I noticed last year when I was department chair. . . that the difference was so great between the negative comment ratio females receiv ed compared to the negative comments the males got that 1 began to get kind of suspicious," Williams said. During this same time period, Arbuckle had been conducting extensive literary research for the psychology of women class at vFYrfJiJ ! ) 1iJfTniriK; r - r i b J 1 1 LJ 1L J WSU and said she had the same suspicions about possible gender biases as Williams. From there, the two decided to see what was really going on at WSU by conducting a study in a classroom setting. Williamsand Arbucklesaid the study was an attempt to discover how males and females comparatively rated their teachers at WSU so that any previous biases students may have would be uncovered."We essentially put together a programmed instruction that involved a standard lecture given to all the students," Williams said. A slide presentation and a prerecorded lecture were given randomly to four different Psychology 101 classes during autumn quarter 1994. In order to control the differentiation factors that sometimes interfere, such as voice patterns, the lecture was prerecorded and great lengths were taken to control the variables, Arbuckle said. Of the four teachers who were selected, two were a male and female under the age of 35, and two were a male and female over 55. "A female voice read both of the lectures for the women and A male voice read both of the lectures for the men, so we control led for voice," Arbuckle said. "In the slide pictures that were taken of the people, the people were placed in exactly the same way, standing the same way and wearing cardigans. The only differences were the gender and the age." Before the lectures began, class members were given an outline of the lecture and informed of the learning objectives. Following the lecture, students were quizzed on the lecture and asked to fill out separate class-andteacher-evaluation forms. Theclassevaluation dealt with the overall content and usefulness of the material, while the teacher evaluation form focused on how individuals perceived the person who was teaching by rating them on terms such as friendliness, nature, honesty, sense of humor, sociability and generosity. These characteristics were selected from a list of general stereotypes, Williams said. "The only difference between all the conditions were the pictures of a young female and an older female, a young male and an older male," he said. Arbuckle said that in terms of teaching abilities, the younger male was pereei ved to be the most credible, while "the older male was perceiv ed as more generous, tolerant and brave." She further added that, in general, the older male was perceived as "a regular boy scout." According to a findings paper the two wrote on the experience, overall scores from the evalua te- Prejudice pae 2 Quick Takes , v.u. J.. , v-sv k: ... V' ... I I A&E Students' future on hold until they learn to hold a fork. See page 5 News Issues Forum gives candidates one more chance to reach voters. See page 2 lOoinion M- Value of Utah's pre-statehood history should not be ignored. See page 4 Sports WSU's Hickman can really throw the stick, man. Sec page 6 Weather Friday Chance of showers 60s30s Weekend a6 Chance of showers 60s30s